Wang Cui was an ordinary outer sect disciple, a common laborer in the Internal Affairs Department.
Today was not so ordinary her favorite steward uncle had his spirit stones deducted, and his face was pale with anger.
After asking around, she found out it wasn’t from anger but from injuries sustained in a secret realm.
Back when Wang Cui had damaged her foundation during a mission and the medicine was delayed in approval, it was this uncle who took out his private stash to help her in the emergency.
Wang Cui was so overjoyed she cried out, “Uncle, from now on, you’re my real uncle!” Steward Fu ignored her. Later, she learned that the uncle was actually three years younger than her…
Wang Cui had written letters to the steward to express her gratitude, but there was never a response. Perhaps the inner sect rules were strict, and the steward couldn’t interact with her much.
Several disciples who had received Fu Yun’s kindness huddled together, whispering and discussing: “Steward Mu said Uncle was poisoned with cold toxin. Would menstrual pain medicine be useful?”
“I still have a piece of warm jade, but Uncle never accepts gifts from us. What should we do?”
“Then let’s ask someone from the Sacred Peak to help bring the medicine in.”
It was at this moment that Xie Yun arrived at the Internal Affairs Department. He was looking for Fu Yun but was surrounded by disciples. Just as he was about to ask, “Signatures or guidance?” the disciples asked him to deliver something.
Outer sect disciples had no chance to see Xie Yun. They only recognized him as a senior brother from the Green Sacred Peak by the token on his person and timidly came to beg him.
After hearing the whole story, Xie Yun smiled and agreed, holding a pile of low-grade elixirs and magical tools. He thought to himself, Fu Yun probably wouldn’t even glance at these things.
He originally planned to discard them, but suddenly he wanted to see Fu Yun’s “frail and pale-faced” miserable state again. He headed toward the auxiliary peak.
Xie Yun was outside the door.
The demon slave was counterattacking.
Fu Yun forcefully drew essence blood from his heart, struggling to suppress it.
The bed was in disarray, stained with blood. It was unfit to be seen, let alone by Xie Yun Fu Yun absolutely did not want to appear disheveled in front of Xie Yun. He refused to open the door.
“Does Senior Brother have urgent matters?” Xie Yun’s voice drifted lazily through the door.
Fu Yun: “I need to bathe and change.”
Xie Yun: “…”
Xie Yun: “I brought medicine for Senior Brother to treat the cold toxin. I’ll leave it by the door.”
Fu Yun politely said, “Thank you, Junior Brother.” Only then did Xie Yun leisurely add, “It was given to Senior Brother by Wang Cui and the others from the outer sect.” Fu Yun fell silent.
He regretted saying one extra polite word to Xie Yun.
Xie Yun left the items but still didn’t leave.
Fu Yun said, “Do you want news from the Discipline Department?”
Xie Yun: “Yes.”
Just like a dog ask once, bark once. Fu Yun told Xie Yun: “The Joyful Union Sect has been destroyed. The landscape of the immortal sects is changing.”
The Joyful Union Sect was considered a mid-to-upper-tier sect. The news of its destruction was sealed by the major immortal sects, kept even from their own disciples. Who would be their next target?
This was something Xie Yun should ponder. If he truly wanted to become a god, he would be in opposition to the major immortal sects spiritual energy was limited. If a god devoured it, what would the countless mouths of the immortal sects feed on?
Let Xie Yun fight with the immortal sects.
Xie Yun, having obtained useful information, finally left.
Fu Yun had cultivated a bamboo grove. Because the Green Sacred had returned to the peak, the bamboo bloomed early. The bamboo leaves were green Xie Yun laughed inwardly at the observation.
He broke off the most elegant and upright branch, stepped onto the bamboo, and rode the wind. When he landed back on the ground, he snapped the bamboo branch and casually tossed it aside.
Only after confirming that Xie Yun had left did Fu Yun check outside the door.
A pile of shabby magical tools. He scoffed but still bent down, picking them up one by one and storing them in his storage pouch.
Perhaps it was the anger Xie Yun had stirred in him that warmed his chilled body a little. He let out a long, pent-up sigh, but the relief was short-lived. The demon slave broke through the blood seal, its demonic aura thick and intense, leaking from the flower mark on its collarbone.
Fu Yun’s blood and qi surged, and he accidentally crushed a warming stone in his hand.
The residual warmth lingered in his palm as his body froze. For a long time.
When Fu Yun entered the array space, his first words were not to question the demon slave but: “Are you hungry?”
The master-slave contract allowed him to sense the demon slave’s condition. It had been fighting the love poison for days, and after the earlier commotion, it was only the hatred for Fu Yun that kept it from collapsing.
Fu Yun tossed a piece of raw meat. The demon snake instinctively sniffed it, then turned away in disgust.
“Don’t like raw meat? Your family raised you well,” Fu Yun remarked.
At the mention of its family, a flicker of emotion passed through the demon slave’s eyes. Fu Yun saw it clearly. “I’m reminded of my family too.”
The demon slave sneered, “I doubt they were any good.”
Fu Yun sighed, “Kindred spirits. My father truly is a scoundrel. Unfortunately, he has a Golden Core guard by his side, and I’m not strong enough to kill him yet.”
“Do you think saying these things will make me willingly let you drain me?”
“No. I mean I will definitely kill my father,” Fu Yun said. “So I’ll take good care of you.”
He asked again, “Are you hungry?”
The demon slave sneered in silence. Fu Yun fed it a pill, and the demon slave immediately felt its body go numb. Thinking the draining was about to begin, it desperately transformed into its giant serpent form, its scales covering its vent.
Fu Yun said out of nowhere, “It’s been years since I last cooked.”
A spiritual blade sliced upward, cutting open the demon slave’s tail.
The serpent demon was horrified to discover: it didn’t hurt. The pill Fu Yun had fed it numbed the pain.
So it remained fully conscious throughout the entire cooking process: scraping off the scales, peeling away the black skin, tearing off the white flesh, drilling into the bones each sound crisp and clear.
Fu Yun used its blood to stew its flesh and its bones as firewood to roast its skin.
He fetched a bowl, added the ingredients, lit the fire, simmered the broth. The spoon clinked against the bowl, each crisp sound marking the passage of time as the painkilling effects of the pill wore off…
“It’s done,” Fu Yun ladled out a bowl. “Eat.”
The demon slave hissed, rasped, roared “Hah, you think I fear death? …Go ahead and kill me…”
Fu Yun smiled.
“Death isn’t frightening,” Fu Yun said gently. “What’s best is being unable to die.”
“Wanting you to neither die nor live is simple cripple your cultivation, starve you until your fat melts away, your bones pierce your skin, then force-feed you, let you live in your own filth.”
“But once you’re so hungry your mind is addled, what won’t you swallow back down?”
With each sentence, an illusion showed the demon slave the corresponding scene: snake stew poured into its mouth, filth flowing from its vent, it retching in disgust.
“After you die, I’ll wash you clean, separate your bones, skin, and flesh. I remember last year at the border black market, boneless snake meat sold for three hundred spirit stones per jin. Bloody meat was more expensive, five hundred.”
Fu Yun smiled and asked, “How much do you weigh?”
As if asking how much its life was worth.
The demon slave trembled uncontrollably.
“But I think living is too hard. Life is more expensive than death,” Fu Yun said gently. “So I’m willing to leave you a little dignity, let you live come, eat a little.”
Fu Yun fed the demon slave the snake stew.
Spoonful by spoonful, the bloodstains on his wrist swayed with each movement, its stomach twisting in knots.
The stew was simmered to perfection, sliding down its throat, the aroma of meat mixed with greasy residue clinging to its throat.
It was full.
Its stomach felt comfortable, and it cried. Due to the trembling of its mind and incomplete transformation, its forked tongue flickered in and out.
Fu Yun coaxed it, “Little demon, you must eat your fill and survive.”
“I’m not called Little Demon. My name is Yi Zhu Qing.” It repeated its own name, reminding itself of who it was.
Excluding the years it slept in the secret realm, it had just turned seventeen. Once it left the secret realm, it lost its name.
Madman, evil spiri . Calling a demon “Little Demon” what difference was there from calling a person “Little Person”?
Its mind was clouded, its voice hoarse, nearly breaking down: “You speak so sweetly. You won’t kill me you want to sleep with me!”
Fu Yun: “Is being slept with by me more shameful than death? But the dead are the ones with the least dignity.”
The demon slave, dazed and confused, retorted: “You humans don’t you speak of leaving a lasting legacy, living on even after death.”
Fu Yun laughed: “Death is death. The living can fantasize about the dead as they please. You take a piece in your heart, I take a piece in mine, millions take millions of pieces, What dignity is there for someone who is dismembered even after death?”
When he mentioned dismemberment, the demon slave recalled the scene of its flesh being carved out.
Fu Yun stroked its head, caressing the cold scales.
After giving the stick, he offered a sweet date, making an empty promise: “Once the energy absorption is done, I’ll let you go.”
The demon slave was so shocked it lost its voice. When it found its voice again, it could only repeat, “Impossible.” Fu Yun retorted: “What would I do with a slave who wants to kill me?”
“From today until the energy absorption is complete, no matter who your master of life is, you are only mine,” Fu Yun said. “Remember that.”
“…”
“Little Demon.”
“Mm.” With a sob.
After a long silence, it asked: “Then… when will you absorb my energy? Do it now.” It only wanted to end it quickly, to transform its partially gnawed snake tail and wrap it around Fu Yun’s fingers.
Snakes mate with their tails.
From then on, every time it felt desire, before the lust, it would inevitably recall a pair of handsthin as blades, slicing scales, peeling skin, scraping flesh, and grinding pulp, merging into its own flesh and blood.
At the moment of a kiss, it would first recall the cold rim of a bowl and a palm brushing past its lips.
Spirit beasts had strong self-healing abilities, and the Teng Snake was especially so. It would grow a complete tail again, but it would never forget that it had eaten itself, its fangs clogged with flesh paste, teaching it temporary obedience.
Fu Yun pulled away the tail tip that had wrapped around him. “Focus on healing.”
The demon slave glared with wide, furious eyes as Fu Yun calmly walked away.
This time, he didn’t reinforce the seal. The demon slave coiled up in the demonic flower, motionless.
Once they left the space, the system asked: “Host, will you really let it go?”
Fu Yun smiled.
The system was reassured. “Hmph, what Teng Snake prince? Is it even worthy of being the host’s slave? Its mouth is so foul it should be washed clean.”
“Be good, shut up. I need to rest for a while,” Fu Yun said.
His soul was injured, and the demon slave had bitten back. He was tired too. But he couldn’t stop thinking.
From himself, he thought of the Dual Cultivation Sect’s cauldrons.
In the secret realm, the Dual Cultivation Sect had gone mad, attacking disciples of various sects. Soon, it was exposed that they had fallen into the demonic path, and their high-ranking cauldrons were divided up… Fu Yun didn’t believe that the major immortal sects hadn’t played a part in fueling this.
The Dual Cultivation Sect had many charismatic figures. At a grand immortal banquet a year ago, Fu Yun had even met one of their elders. Amidst all kinds of gazes, she laughed and conversed freely.
As an immortal attendant, Fu Yun poured wine for her. She grabbed his sleeve and smiled, saying what beautiful hands he had.
Perfect for holding a sword. The elder rubbed the calluses on Fu Yun’s tiger’s mouth. Then she added, “I once thought of learning the sword too.”
Watching her rise to great heights, only to see her fall.
Fu Yun lowered his eyes, lost in thought. As his emotions stirred, one after another, inner demon phantoms flickered before him. He was used to it and couldn’t be bothered to pay them any mind. Until a figure in blue-green robes walked gracefully toward him.
Fu Yun froze for a moment, instinctively reaching out a hand, only to curl his fingers back.
He saw the only person he had ever loved.